Overview
Create custom bullet styles to use different fonts, spacing, bullet symbols, or other formats to bullet lists in your report. To do this, you'll need to edit the Word Styles inside your report template.
How it works
You'll need to create a paragraph style for each bullet indent level your document uses.
These styles will apply by default to content generated from mail merge tags (sheet cells and form fields).
You can optionally create different bullet styles specific to sheet cells or form fields.
If you want to use your custom bullet styles on fixed content in your report (as in, text that's not from mail merge tags), you’ll need to apply your styles manually.
If you need help adding custom bullet styles to a report, contact our support team via chat or email us at [email protected].
Create custom bullet styles
Word offers five built-in bullet styles (List Bullet, List Bullet 2, and so on) for different levels of indentation. These are also known as paragraph styles. Instead of using these default styles, you can create custom styles with your chosen font, spacing, and other desired settings.
To add custom bullet styles:
Open the Styles menu in Word. Create a new paragraph style called FieldguideDefaultBullets.
Add your desired formatting settings to the style.
(Optional) Repeat the steps above to create another style for each indent level you plan on using in bullet lists. Name each subsequent style “FieldguideDefaultBullets” followed by a number representing the indent level. If you plan on having bullet lists indented up to three levels, your styles should be named like this:
Use the Increase Indent button to set the indent level associated with a style.
Preview your style(s) and adjust the formatting, as needed. Enable the Show preview setting in the Styles menu to see what each style looks like inside the pane.
If you're not seeing your custom styles listed in the Styles menu, go to Options and set Select styles to show to "In current document".
Formatting suggestions
Word has many formatting options for custom styles. Below are a few ideas to help you get started.
Use a custom symbol or image for bullet points
To set a custom symbol for bullet points:
Open the editor for your custom bullet style and go to Format > Numbering > Bullets.
Select an option from Word's bullet library, or click Define New Bullet to add a custom symbol.
Create bullet styles customized for sheets or forms
If you create custom bullet styles using the “FieldguideDefaultBullets” name, this style will automatically apply to any bullets that generate from sheet cells and form fields. If you want the bullet styling in sheet cells or form fields to differ from each other, you can create the custom styles listed below.
To create custom bullet styles for sheet cells: Follow the instructions above to create your custom bullet styles, but use the name “FieldguideSheetBullets” for the styles.
To create custom bullet styles for form fields: Follow the instructions above to create your custom bullet styles, but use the name “FieldguideFormBullets” for the styles.
Apply custom bullet styles
For content that generates from mail merge tags, your custom bullet styles will apply automatically in the generated report whenever the data from a sheet cell or form field contains bullet points.
Your custom bullet style won't add bullets that aren't already there. The sheet cell or form field must already contain text with bullet points, and then your custom style will apply to the bullets when you generate the report.
To add bullets to text in sheet cells, add the proper formatting.
To add bullets to text in form fields, use a formatted text form field.
To apply your custom bullet styles to fixed content, apply your styles manually to the desired text inside the report template.
You don’t need to manually apply any bullet styles to text that comes from mail merge tags — Fieldguide will apply it automatically in the generated report. You only need to manually apply styles to fixed content (as in, text that's not from mail merge tags).
About Word styles priority
Any custom bullet styles inside your report template's Styles menu will override the default bullet styles on data generated from sheets and forms.
The FieldguideSheetBullets and FieldguideFormBullets styles will override the FieldguideDefaultBullets styles and any other default bullet styles on text generated from sheets and forms, respectively.
Remove custom bullet styles
To remove a custom bullet style, delete it from the Styles menu. To remove all custom bullet styles and revert back to Word's default bullet style, delete all of these styles:
FieldguideDefaultBullets
FieldguideSheetBullets
FieldguideFormBullets